Escambia High Gators: Schedules and Varsity Game Summary

Kooi carries Crusaders to win

Chuck Corder ccorder@pnj.com

Some nights, the end result doesn't deliver on the hype.
This was not one of those nights Friday at Gorecki-LeBeau Stadium. The showdown of two of the Pensacola Bay Area's most prolific players didn't disappoint.
Catholic's David Kooi and Escambia's Trent Richardson put on a wire-to-wire show that refused to end until Kooi and his Crusaders edged the Gators 30-28.
"They're a bigger school and we have talking rights," Kooi said.
The Super Senior quarterback can talk for a lifetime about the night he lit Escambia's defense up for 480 yards of total offense. Richardson will have a yarn to spin, too, after he slapped Catholic around for 299 rushing yards, his second time this season to eclipse 250 or more yards.
"Trent's going to be special before he finishes," Gators coach Jimmy Nichols said. "Trent's problem is he wants to score every play, and not every play is a touchdown. He's got a great heart. I've enjoyed coaching him."
The individual performances certainly jump off the page, but more eye-popping was the 21-point deficit Catholic (4-5) erased to get its third consecutive victory in this series.
"They came out and punched us in the mouth," Crusaders coach Greg Seibert said. "For a young team like us to rise up and punch back, that says a lot. We were fortunate to come out on top."
Fortunate to have the 6-foot-5 Kooi slinging it around the ball park.
You ready for this: Kooi finished with 407 yards passing, throwing three touchdowns to Garrison Lipscomb (6) and Tony Weathers (5, 81). Oh by the way, he also toasted Escambia (2-5) on the ground, chewing up 73 yards.
Sick, right? That's no fantasy football. That's the real McCoy. Just ask the coach trying to stop him.
"I think the guy's a great player, I really do," said Nichols, who was shocked to know Kooi's only scholarship offer is from Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. "The boy at PHS (Keldric White) is good, but he's not in this boy's (Kooi's) league."
The same could be said for his running back.
Way back on Aug. 30, the season's opening night, Richardson established himself as the one all other Bay Area running backs would chase this year. Then, he finished with 408 yards in a rout of Tate.
He had 222 with 10:15 in the second quarter Friday after he sprinted to daylight three times, the last a 94-yard jaunt where he seemed to glide down the gut of the field.
"It seemed like he ran for 400 in the first half," Seibert said of Richardson. "Trent is the prototype back — big, strong, he cuts well. I don't know anybody that can catch him. I know I couldn't."
He didn't have to. And, lucky for him, the Crusaders actually did manage to bottle up Richardson despite a 12-yard touchdown run early in the fourth quarter.
Catholic's defense controlled the line of scrimmage, limiting the junior to just 56 yards in the second half.
"That says a lot about our senior leadership," Crusaders linebacker Zack Wenzel said. "We came together, got the younger guys to settle down and let the offense take over the game."
Kooi was happy to oblige, wasting little time after leaving the locker room at halftime behind 21-16.
On the first play of the second half, from his own 19, Kooi hit Weathers on a bubble screen down the left side of the line of scrimmage.
Weathers got great blocking from his receiving corps and did the rest himself, racing 81 yards across the goal line.
"Every time I get the ball, all I see is green," Weathers said. "I want to get to the end zone every time."